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General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions
2e, the most lethal edition?
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<blockquote data-quote="Hussar" data-source="post: 7638415" data-attributes="member: 22779"><p>Couple of points.</p><p></p><p>1. I did actually state 3e, not 3.5, so, great axes were the stat block. </p><p></p><p>2. You needed to have about 12-14 encounters (at par level) per level to gain a level. Meaning a 3 orc encounter was a CR 1 encounter - standard encounter for a 1st level party. Presume 2 rounds of combat and that's 6 attacks/encounter. Multiply by 12 and that's now 72 attacks per level. Suddenly that spike damage of 28 (ish) on the mean, which instantly kills every 1st level character, isn't all that rare. </p><p></p><p>3. Missing the point. Sure you could add in giant bees. Fair enough. But, not every encounter featured giant bees. Some did, and they would be deadly, but, some didn't. I mean, look at Keep on the Borderlands - a couple of hundred encounters and only, maybe 5% have save or die effects. It's not like these were encountered all the time.</p><p></p><p>But, 10XCR was the baseline for 3e creatures for max damage. They essentially only had to get lucky once. The PC's had to get lucky every time.</p><p></p><p>------</p><p></p><p>IME, the reason 3e wasn't very lethal is because of softball DM's creatively interpreting die rolls. Ie. Fudging. They didn't want to kill the PC's, so, they ignored it. Or, they had monsters spread their attacks out and never focus fire. Instead of that giant pumping all three attacks into one PC, the DM spread the damage so no one ever died.</p><p></p><p>I mean, good grief, a fire giant, without using power attack does 9d6+45 points of damage. Give him 5 points of power attack, and now he does 9d6+75 points of damage. This is a CR 10 creature. Never minding crits, his standard damage will kill PC's.</p><p></p><p>To me, it's no contest. 3e, played by the book, is far, far more lethal than AD&D ever was. Most encounters in AD&D aren't really a threat to the PC's. The odds of killing a PC through damage was incredibly low. But, in 3e, the monsters potentially could drop PC's every single round. There's a reason they talk about 3e rocket tag.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Hussar, post: 7638415, member: 22779"] Couple of points. 1. I did actually state 3e, not 3.5, so, great axes were the stat block. 2. You needed to have about 12-14 encounters (at par level) per level to gain a level. Meaning a 3 orc encounter was a CR 1 encounter - standard encounter for a 1st level party. Presume 2 rounds of combat and that's 6 attacks/encounter. Multiply by 12 and that's now 72 attacks per level. Suddenly that spike damage of 28 (ish) on the mean, which instantly kills every 1st level character, isn't all that rare. 3. Missing the point. Sure you could add in giant bees. Fair enough. But, not every encounter featured giant bees. Some did, and they would be deadly, but, some didn't. I mean, look at Keep on the Borderlands - a couple of hundred encounters and only, maybe 5% have save or die effects. It's not like these were encountered all the time. But, 10XCR was the baseline for 3e creatures for max damage. They essentially only had to get lucky once. The PC's had to get lucky every time. ------ IME, the reason 3e wasn't very lethal is because of softball DM's creatively interpreting die rolls. Ie. Fudging. They didn't want to kill the PC's, so, they ignored it. Or, they had monsters spread their attacks out and never focus fire. Instead of that giant pumping all three attacks into one PC, the DM spread the damage so no one ever died. I mean, good grief, a fire giant, without using power attack does 9d6+45 points of damage. Give him 5 points of power attack, and now he does 9d6+75 points of damage. This is a CR 10 creature. Never minding crits, his standard damage will kill PC's. To me, it's no contest. 3e, played by the book, is far, far more lethal than AD&D ever was. Most encounters in AD&D aren't really a threat to the PC's. The odds of killing a PC through damage was incredibly low. But, in 3e, the monsters potentially could drop PC's every single round. There's a reason they talk about 3e rocket tag. [/QUOTE]
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2e, the most lethal edition?
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